


As I Lay Dying

by Maiisbuns



Category: Banana Fish (Anime & Manga)
Genre: Angst, Bittersweet, Hurt No Comfort, Hurt/Comfort, Other, This Is Sad, im sad, well unless you count ash comforting himself
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-09
Updated: 2020-06-09
Packaged: 2021-03-03 23:00:19
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,080
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24633472
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Maiisbuns/pseuds/Maiisbuns
Summary: In so many ways Ash held onto a sliver of hope that he could experience it. Freedom. And in some ways he got it.
Comments: 10
Kudos: 23
Collections: Banana Fish Reverse Big Bang





	As I Lay Dying

When someone is dying it’s said that their entire life flashes before their eyes. What bullshit. 

The only thing that Ash can see is the kaleidoscopic warp of the sidewalk in front of him, and the sunlight waning in a red chiaroscuro. 

He needs to move faster. 

But a sense of urgency has all but left him. As he walks, clutching his middle, letting the blood soak through to his sleeve, he feels no pain. He knows it’s likely shock, but the numbness seems to take hold, caressing his wound, and enveloping everything down to his bones. He would hate to say it almost feels—good.

His legs buckle causing him to veer off his trail to a bus stop, collapsing onto a bench. When a woman and her son hurry past, Ash attempts to straighten his posture, gritting his teeth at the effort. 

He’s always tried to save other kids from it. As if shielding someone else’s youth might atone for the one he’d lost. 

Ash remembers, before the baseball team, before Griffin left, when his father pulled him aside, still sopping wet from a day at the lake. He’d shoved a bottle of coke in his hands and knelt the way father’s do, resting their elbows on their knees, looking straight ahead, through you but also just past. 

“Your mom—“ He began, then bit his lip, “You gotta understand, she ain’t comin’ back.”

At the time, Ash didn’t care. They had a day at the lake—it was nice. He’d only asked about her twice that day, way less than usual. 

“So?” Ash shrugs.

“So, you got me and Griff. That’s all that matters.”

He was right, for a while. The kindness of a father, and the guidance of an older brother were enough. He did all the things normal boys would, get their names embroidered on the inside of baseball mitts, played catch, and went fishing then ran through the grass of the rolling hill by the house. He remembers they would taste new dishes at the diner and pretend that his dad was capable of cooking anything more than what could only be described as burnt rubber.

Sometimes if he closes his eyes and thinks back far enough he can still hear the sing-song voice of Griffin yelling ‘hey batter batter!’ Followed by his father’s bellowing ‘swing!’

Part of him wants to thank Jim for that. For a sense of normalcy even in its brevity, all before it went to shit. 

Ash had tried to hold on tight, even after his father started to fall apart, even after he blamed him, after all of it. Eventually he was passed on to Griffin like an unwanted puppy that never learned housetraining. He remembers crying for days, and then another fleeting happiness, until finally Griff left too.

The feeling of falling pulls him back to the present. 

His shoulder hits the seat of the bench first, sending a wave of pain through his muscles and into the wound. Ash knows most pain is bearable through steady breathing and gritted teeth, even if only for a little while.

“Dammit.” He counts to three before forcing himself upright to begin the rest of his walk. 

Skyscrapers bow ahead of him, revealing the sun that is slowly beginning to set, casting streaks of orange and red creating a burning sky. Clouds spill shadows over him, adding more chill to the biting cold of this year’s New York winter. 

Ash tries to find warmth in the subway, dangling a foot over the first step and then toppling, slowly, one after another. 

On his first night away from home he’d taken a greyhound, a route directly from Cape Cod to Manhattan with money he’d been taking from the diner; a culmination of damn near no tips—just a handful of twenties. A whopping total of about seventy five dollars. 

That night was the first time Ash entered the mouth of a subway platform, he pretended it was a dragon’s belly, just a staircase away from being slain. The twisting lines of the colored map were the intestines, and the locations were weak points to be explored. It took the fear away, until he stepped onto the train itself, curling into one of the plastic seats.

Ash had been picking at his shoe laces, listening to the rattle and clack of the subway against the rails. 

“Where are your parents?” 

Golzine had been just as much of a vulture back then. If Ash has been any less of a dumbass kid he might’ve seen it. 

But instead, Ash glanced up, using his heel to scoot back as far into the seat as he could. “I’m—I’m meeting up with my pop. He’s just off work, I gotta get off soon.”

As promised he exited as soon as the subway doors slid open, nearly tripping over himself as he sprinted for the stairs back up to the towering buildings of the city. He’d spend a week alone slipping from alleyway to alleyway, clutching a plastic bag full of chips and soda from a nearby convenience store. 

By the second week, he’d learned about a homeless shelter in the Bronx. Getting in had been easy, he’d see the line, and walk up to the nearest woman that could pass as his mother and simply stand next to her. No questions, no odd looks, just a hot meal and a bed for the night. 

It was the end of that second week where his routine was interrupted. The beds were full. Most people would wait around nearby until the following night. Ash followed suit, crouching on the first landing of a fire escape just a few streets away from the shelter. 

He remembers it was raining that day. The downpour hadn’t let up even after sundown, and the grated stairs didn’t do shit as a shelter. 

After wandering for another block or so he’d stopped to rest underneath an awning that belonged to some closed down smoke shop. Propping himself up against the wall he tore at a damp, empty box of Pall Malls. 

“So we meet again.” Golzine had said it with the warmest smile, kneeling down to meet him. 

Ash buried his head into his knees.

“It’s not safe here. Is your father nearby?”

Ash shook his head.

Without warning he felt the weight of a coat heating him up and the pressure of a hand gently leading him to the car.

Where could he have gone from there? 

Chance had a nasty way of constantly making him feel like shit. From the moment the door closed on that 76’ Rolls Royce, everything just started to feel like one long bad dream. 

He’d been stuck with Golzine for about three years. Three years of the same. In the morning he’d have lessons and be left to wander by the afternoon. After dinner he’d be asked to come to bed. Though, he couldn’t say every day ended the same. Some nights Golzine wouldn’t touch him, but that would usually mean someone else had. 

That was why he guessed Blanca came, to give the product a means of quality control. 

But no one knew what tools of self preservation would give him. Through their own training they fitted him with the teeth and claws they tried so hard to never see bared. They created their own fucking devil.

Though, in time he’d become a teacher all his own. From his first few weeks as a boss he remembered teaching Skipper the ins and outs of cleaning a gun, and in the same breath to always have some restraint when pulling the trigger. 

In no time he’d made gunmen out of so many street kids. Gave them guidance and weapons to the teeth. 

To everyone else they’d also be seen as devils, a bunch of do-nothing shit kids parading around New York. 

But Ash knew them, how they would all fall over each other every morning, scrambling to gather supplies all the while butting heads. He knows how they’d laugh over a few beers the night after a job. Each of them, all radiant in their own ways, all working together and against each other in just the right manner.

Ash knows Alex could talk damn near anyone into anything with a smile and a few words of reassurance. Not to mention he was the only one with enough common sense to not go rushing into something guns blazing, no matter how hard everyone would try to push it. 

Kong and Bones were made of nothing but fierce loyalty. To this day Ash doesn’t think even Blanca could’ve gotten a word out of them.

And Skipper...he’d been found on the street. Curled up next to a toy store clutching the latest version of Crystar. Only a few months after Ash finds him he was already downing rum cokes and playing craps with the best of them.

And Shorter...

Just a bunch of kids.

Noisy New York traffic causes Ash to realize he’s trudged back out of the station and onto the street. The dizziness of the blood loss seems to have spun him around, making it nearly impossible to figure out which way is north. 

He wonders how Blanca would look at him now.

For someone who brags about knowing this city like the back of his hand he wish he could see straight enough to read a fucking street sign. Between the spinning and the fact that his legs are buckling with every step, Ash isn’t sure where exactly he’s going. From the library to—where? 

He takes a moment to lean against a wall, pulling his hand away from his abdomen for just a second. But the shirt is sticking to his palms, and as soon as he moves it he gets light headed. 

“Fucking idiot.” Ash hisses.

Part of him wishes Lao had any sense of where he was aiming when he charged him. Anywhere would be better than what Ash can assume is technically—nowhere. Knife wounds didn’t often reach far enough to get to the stomach, and the intestines would shift over before anything. If he got an artery he would at least be dead by now. 

After a few shaky deep breaths he tries making out the blurred letters of the street signs again. 

Still on Fifth, huh?

His free hand reached into the pocket of his coat. Letting his fingers glide over the paper, he shuts his eyes right before taking the plane ticket into them and crumpling it. 

As he turns back his eyes begin to sting, leaving warm streaks down his cheeks. 

Everyone was right. There was no escaping the life that had been chosen for him. But damn if he didn’t try. 

In so many ways he held onto a sliver of hope that he could experience it. Freedom. And in some ways he got it. 

As Ash lurches forward a smile tugs at the corner of his lips. He’d known happiness, no matter how sparse. He’d known it from his first real friend in Shorter, to the moment he’d taken on becoming a boss.

He almost wishes he could tell Sing now. Being a boss isn’t all bad. You have the power to control _something_ , anything. You have the power to protect them. 

If he could only look past all the bad stuff, all the guns, and drugs, and the fucking murder. He’d like to be able to say he helped. Even if it was just Shorter, Skip, Alex, the guys—Eiji. For just a moment, none of them had to feel alone.

As he steps foot back into the library he holds onto that. The vicious cycle of saving whoever needed it, round and round, never ending. And he wouldn’t change it for a thing. 

A fit of coughs that taste a little like iron tear at his lungs as he slips into his usual spot. They roll into small wheezes as he hurriedly unfolds Eiji’s letter and smooths it out on the table in front of him. But while he reads his eyes are getting heavy and it’s growing more difficult to keep upright. 

He doesn’t even realize he’s laid his head down, curling the edge of the paper toward him. 

_My Soul Is Always With You._

The chirp of the librarian comes and goes, and it’s in that moment Ash knows this isn’t a punishment. It’s the call of freedom welcoming him home.

  
  
  


**Author's Note:**

> For the Banana Fish Reverse Big Bang :)  
> Artwork by Aisha_Kami on twitter/aishakami on tumblr!


End file.
